Land Clearing
Reached out and asked a close friend of mine if I could rent him and his wife out for a day of felling and bucking trees. They were kind of enough to bring food and adult beverages for break-time. Not that I would ever advocate in mixing chainsaws and beer, but when you are all done with the sawing there is nothing better than a sit down with friends and cold beer.
A person really doesn't get a sense of the size of the house until you start stepping off actual footage on the parcel. What we did was stake to out the approximate size of the footprint of the house. It was in that moment the gravity of the chores before us was no joke. I have no problem dropping a few balsams here and there or a big aspen tree, but when the task is reaching into that 40-50 tree scope, my back starts to twinge just a bit.
We spent the Saturday sawing and sawing and more sawing. I am proud to announce I only hung up one tree into another! I know it doesn't sound like much, but my ability to screw up is legendary. We felled 31 trees, and bucked up logs (full disclosure I know the term is bucking, and I am not sure it can be changed to past tense- but it's a blog so who gives a shit).
Sunday we went to a new Northern Tool and bought a new Stihl. I spent 15 minutes on safety and instruction and turned the new saw over to my girlfriend. She was a quick study and spent 5 plus hours on Sunday limbing and bucking (still not sure about the tense). I moved the cut wood and started to make ranks.
Lessons learned from the afternoon. While these are not new lessons, this is what I took away from the day. Bring extra bar chain lube and grease for the bar. We fouled the bar a few times and need to spend time gouging out the dirt and chips. Bring lots of gas and oil. I purchased two chains from L&M that I didn't want to buy but the shop was out of the Oregon chains. The knock of brand lasted four cuts before sheering the teeth on the bottom and was useless. Bring wedges to your site. They are absolutely incredible and worth their weight in gold when needing to disengage a bar from a tree, or dropping a tree in a directionally appropriate location!
A person really doesn't get a sense of the size of the house until you start stepping off actual footage on the parcel. What we did was stake to out the approximate size of the footprint of the house. It was in that moment the gravity of the chores before us was no joke. I have no problem dropping a few balsams here and there or a big aspen tree, but when the task is reaching into that 40-50 tree scope, my back starts to twinge just a bit.
We spent the Saturday sawing and sawing and more sawing. I am proud to announce I only hung up one tree into another! I know it doesn't sound like much, but my ability to screw up is legendary. We felled 31 trees, and bucked up logs (full disclosure I know the term is bucking, and I am not sure it can be changed to past tense- but it's a blog so who gives a shit).
Sunday we went to a new Northern Tool and bought a new Stihl. I spent 15 minutes on safety and instruction and turned the new saw over to my girlfriend. She was a quick study and spent 5 plus hours on Sunday limbing and bucking (still not sure about the tense). I moved the cut wood and started to make ranks.
Lessons learned from the afternoon. While these are not new lessons, this is what I took away from the day. Bring extra bar chain lube and grease for the bar. We fouled the bar a few times and need to spend time gouging out the dirt and chips. Bring lots of gas and oil. I purchased two chains from L&M that I didn't want to buy but the shop was out of the Oregon chains. The knock of brand lasted four cuts before sheering the teeth on the bottom and was useless. Bring wedges to your site. They are absolutely incredible and worth their weight in gold when needing to disengage a bar from a tree, or dropping a tree in a directionally appropriate location!
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